Critical Essay by Robert H. Canary

[The framework of Watch the North Wind Rise] exhibits a duality characteristic of the genre of the "fantastic," [and] it provides an example of the way in which similar dualities may be found in utopian works…. (pp. 248-49)

Although set in a future alternative world, Watch the North Wind Rise maintains a certain tension between natural and supernatural explanations for what Venn-Thomas sees in New Crete, as well as for the dream-journey which takes him there. The poet-magicians who have summoned him believe implicitly in their own magic powers, but the magic which Venn-Thomas actually observes is explainable in terms of psychological suggestion and common sense…. (p. 249)

New Crete shares with many other utopias a caste system, and Watch the North Wind Rise includes both implicit and explicit satire on this feature of utopias. (p. 250)